Quiet
by Bulldust
Summary: Wawelski was a wolf of many skills and abilities. He could fight off any wolf with natural ease, face danger head on, protect his family from anything that could harm them. The element of surprise, however, was not one of his strong suits.


"_Waw, will you SHUT. UP."_

The ginger yearling gave a low growl as he batted a thorny stem from his face. His smaller beige counterpart bared her teeth in a silent snarl before glancing back through the branches. The pair were a part of a larger hunting party surrounding the lowlands; their objective: scan the herd for any weak calves and signal the rest of the party. Yet one of the wolves was an obvious weak link.

Wawelski didn't want to join at all; rather, he wanted to spend as much time as he could with his sister. His newly promoted position to Subordinate left him with a lot less time on his hands than he preferred, but he kept the other yearlings in check and away from his kin. Or at least, that was the plan.

Ever since he plucked the Heiress out of the rapids a month ago the Alpha Male's leadership was under scrutiny. Some pack mates questioned Harvey's apathy and his treatment toward daughter and the Omega who saved her. And so to keep the good graces with the Council, the Alpha decided to call up his immediate children into a family hunting party at dawn. His explanations were that he needed to 'bond' with his children and 'strengthen family ties,' but his Heiress Jazzy was having none of it. And so, that was how Waweslki found himself in the middle of a bush, with said Heiress growling at him for every which way he moved.

"Can you stop being so LOUD. You're going to spook the herd." Jazzy hissed between her teeth as she crouched under the budding branches.

The larger male ripped off a branch that was jabbing into his shoulder with a growl, "How the hell am I supposed to get through this. It's tearing whatever is left of my fur!" Truth be told, in the still early spring most of the pack still had clumps of their winter coats on their flanks. The red Subordinate was no exception, until he was forced to crawl under a budding grove of bushes, leaving thick red patches on their stems.

The young Heiress was about to snap at him again, when he slipped on the softened ground. The red wolf gave a muffled bark as his body tumbled forward and crashed through the outer branches, landing in sight of the herd. The cows cried in alarm and sent the herd racing, taking their precious calves with them.

Jazzy stumbled out of the shrubs just in time to notice her pack mates rising up across the area in confusion, looking at her, then to the herd and back. When neither Heiress nor Subordinate signalled an order, the party was at a loss. Some blindly charged after the herd in the hopes of a meal, others remained behind and wandered out into the open.

The sudden cacophony of noise died down to a distant roar, slowly being drowned out by the quiet murmurings of the pack as they spoke to one another. A moment later, the beige she wolf sat down in the grass and looked at her paws, away from the prying eyes of her subordinates. Wawelski was busying himself with pulling trigs from his pelt, the tension in the air going right over his head.

He spat a discarded stem onto the ground and looked at the smaller wolf, giving her a prod with a paw. "Oi," he was met with a quiet snarl from the smaller wolf, "Why are we just sitting around, we gotta go hunt the calves right?"

Jazzy pricked her ears, turning to give him a sidelong glance. "... You're a bloody idiot, aren't you." She rounded on him with fangs flashing, "How dense can you be! The herd is gone Wawelski, and there's no way we can catch up to them." He was about to snap at her for the insult when she turned once more, "Just get out of here Waw, you don't want to be here when my Father comes."

Although he wanted to continue their banter, he much rather preferred his freedom, and took his leave. The young Heiress sat with her eyes to the ground as the red brute stomped into the treeline.

He was well on his way back to his family when a booming voice rang out across the hunting grounds. "WHO DID IT!" Wawellski swung his head around to see Harvey's form crest the hill to the rest of the party. It was hard to see from the foliage, but from the sound of his voice and the tension in his high tail, the Subordinate could deduce that the Alpha Male was pissed.

The brown wolf had a snarl on his face and a rise on his withers as he glared at the gathered wolves. "Which one of you spineless rogues sent the herd running before the signal?" No one answered, only looking away anxiously, and it threw Harvey into a full on rage. "You are all worthless, wasteful bags of flesh! You are better off being thrown to the scavengers! I'll-"

"It was me."

The Hunting Grounds grew silent once more, all heads turning to the beige Heiress sitting with her gaze on her paws. Without a word, Harvey approached her, and Jazzy tried not to flinch as his stomps grew louder. He wrapped his jaws around her scruff and threw her to the ground with a roar. He was on top of her in seconds, pinning her down with a none too gentle foot. Wawelski felt the ire of rage boil in his gut at the sight. Jazzy kept her head turned away and eyes screwed shut as Harvey snarled in her face. "Now you've done it, you little scum. First you made me look bad with you trying to kill youself in that river, then you ruin my reputation once again with a foiled hunt! You've not only made a fool of me, but of our entire bloodline. Perhaps my new litter will have a worthy successor, if they dont starve because of you."

The heavy weight was off her a moment later, with the Alpha pushing her into the dirt. She slowly got up as Harvey rallied the party and marched away from the area, leaving only her and the red wolf in the trees. She was standing when the Subordinate approached her, though she faced away from him with her head and tail low. He was gambling in his head whether to move closer when her voice gave a soft croak. "I never should have invited you."

With nothing he could say, he left.

"_You just LEFT!?"_

Wawelski turned his head away from his sister to protect his ear from the verbal assault. "What did you expect me to do, fight Harvey again?"

Dracorex was giving him the hardest stare she could muster, "You should be grovelling at her feet Waw, she saved your skin. If the Alpha found out it was you that ruined the hunt he would tan your hide and feed your sorry rear to his pups!"

"Hey. I do not _grovel_."

"Well then tough guy, you're just going to have to make it up to her. Friends don't left each other down." He rolled his eyes at the term 'friend,' and he was met with a headbutt. "You lost the herd, now you're going to have to make it up to her by hunting something else for her. It's the very least you can do." Wawelski gave a low grumble as the lighter she wolf hobbled down the hillside. "I gotta help Mother with bringing food to the den sites, I'll see you later."

He watched her retreating form with a snort. All he had to do to get in Jazzy's good graces was to give her a kill? That would be simple enough.

Existence was suffering and he wanted the world to burn. He was exhausted, filthy, and had nothing to show for it, except for the twigs and leaves that collected onto his pelt throughout the day. No one told him hunting would be so atrociously difficult. His first failed hunt had him sniffing out a young moose calf, except that its mother had also sniffed him out as well. Needless to say the wolf was sent running for the hills with more than enough kicks to the rump. With traditional hunting methods out of the question, he resorted to hunting for rodents and small fauna in the woodlands.

It turns out that hunting small animals is a lot more complex than hunting ungulates. Squirrels had an uncanny knack for swinging behind trees and scaling them at the last possible second. Wawelski smashed his head into enough trunks to scratch squirrels and birds off his list.

His next option was hare. They were plump, juicy, but oh so _fast_. Now, Wawelski was proud to admit that he liked his massive size. He could intimidate even the most hardened veterans in the pack. But the added weight made it nearly impossible to match a hare's stride. What's more, he felt like the hares were _taunting _him. They knew he was too slow to be a threat so they bounded at a relaxed pace. Every time he felt like he was about to catch one, they'd suddenly change direction, leaving him tumbling into the grass.

Scratching out woodlands and grasslands, the last possible area were the riverbanks. Waterfowl were off the table, he doubted his skills in catching one midair or mid swim. Instead he tried his hand at fishing. Every shot he made was a miss, but the red wolf felt like he was starting to get somewhere. Fish were quite thick skulled, and were easy to fool. All he had to do was stay quiet. His vigil was broken by a panicked family of beavers who had spotted him, taking on the offensive and splashing him with their flat tails. With the fish gone and his coat furrowly soaked, Wawelski soon left the water and moved upstream, where he remained for the rest of the day.

The red male was scowling down at his angry reflection. He was furious with himself and his inability to catch anything. His peers were out catching elk double their size, and he couldn't even catch a mouse. Even his sister who was reduced to three legs was still more useful than him. It wasn't fair. The blazing yellow eyes staring back at him narrowed, and he curled his lip. He stood up on his hind legs, and threw his forepaws down on the riverbank with a loud "Dammit!"

His heavy paws crashed straight through the bank and sent him tumbling into the sodden earth and mud. He gave a snarl as he pulled himself out of the collapsed burrow, covered in mud. He spat out the wet earth and shook out his coat, flicking his paws to get the clumps of sod out. When he blew the mud out of his nose he breathed in the fresh scent of blood. He looked about his pelt for any sign of bleeding. Nothing. He took another sniff to find it was emanating from the burrow he had just vacated. Curiously, he started to dig with a paw in the earth until he found the body of a muskrat. It was caked in a layer of mud and grime, with its head flattened from a crushing blow., its tail giving the occasional twitch. The red wolf's tail gave a victorious wag as he scooped up the rodent and plodded through the trees to find out where the Heiress went.

It took him about an hour to find the beige wolf. He had passed quite a few gawking wolves as he travelled about the territory as the sun set below the mountains. Eventually, he found her in the same area as where he left her. She looked to be doing much better mood wise, but there was still a cloud over her head.

Jazzy's head was lowered and sniffing the ground when Waweslki stomped over to her, and the yearling jumped in surprise at the sight of him. "Woah! Is that you Waw? What happe-" Her nose crinkled as the male drew closer, giving a grimace and backing up a pace at the odor, "On second thought, I don't want to know."

It was then that her eyes caught the small figure dangling between the Subordinate's teeth. He tossed it a few feet toward her, sitting down with a grunt. "I killed it. Take it."

She gave it a skeptical sniff, "...What is it?"

"I dunno, I found it and killed it."

"Uh huh. And uh, how did you kill it?"

"Doesn't matter."

"Right…" She gave him a look once again, thinking. "Hey Waw? I'm sorry for yelling at you earlier. It should have crossed my mind that no one taught you or Draco how to hunt-"

"Wait. You're supposed to learn? I thought you were born with it." The look the red male gave her was enough to make the she wolf laugh.

She recovered and gave him a grin, "No one is born a killing machine, you have to be taught how to kill." She turned back to the muskrat and gave it a nudge with her foot, "The hunting party actually managed to hunt two calves this morning. The few Subordinate Alphas who didn't stay behind with us took some down in the panic, so the denning mothers can eat tonight." She looked up to meet his gaze with a softer smile, "How about tomorrow when I'm not busy, I can help teach you and Draco some hunting basics?"

Wawelski felt the tension ease from his shoulders, "...Sure."

"Great, and Waw? Please go swim in the river, you smell like crap."

Author's Note: Please be patient with him Jazzy, he doesn't know how to function like a productive member in society. Harvey and Jazzy belong to Pidge on WolfQuest Amino, rest belong to me.

If you want to have a better expierence reading and get to know more about the lore of my characters, visit my amino profile here: /c/wolfquest/page/user/bulldust-is-busy/JJBm_EXI0fV7pM6J5dJ8mmDxL8BerXB6dWHm


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